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Road to Recovery

I haven’t written in a very long time but I think my broken ankle has made me feel like I should write down my thoughts. I am thankful that despite the crazy accident (slipping on ice on my way to work...), everything has gone smoothly. My surgery, where they inserted a metal plate and screws into my leg, went smoothly. People have come to visit and my parents have been amazing supports. I’ve felt a lot of peace about this whole season in my life - trusting that God has great things in store and that this is still for my good and for His glory. 

Then today I saw my cast removed and saw the condition of my leg. It was an odd feeling. On one hand, I knew this was going to happen. My physio friends have all warned me that it’s ugly under my cast and my calf will be half the size of the other one. But seeing it...then trying to move it...and it not really working out like I remembered was all so overwhelming. I realized, for maybe the first time in my life, the feebleness of my body. It was frustrating and humbling and saddening all at the same time. Then I had this thought...

“ Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.” - Phillipians 2:5-8

Christ, who was God, became man and chose to be placed in a feeble body like this...why? He went from being limitless to being limited and constrained by our physical form so that he can dwell among men and become obedient to death. My limits has brought a whole new understanding of this passage and even then I know my understanding is not full.

I trust the path through physiotherapy will be painful and frustrating but I’m learning to be patient with my body. If Christ was willing to dwell in human form, he probably didn’t count efficiency something to be grasped either...so I must also learn not to count it as something to be grasped.

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If I go upon the Lord's errand with a simple reliance upon His power and a single eye to His glory, it is certain that He will be with me. His sending me binds Him to back me up. Is not this enough? What more can I want?

Charles Spurgeon

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And so a good marriage is a good marriage because people in that marriage realize they are not the Messiah to one another. But they don’t panic, because they have been given an adequate and sufficient Messiah who invades marriage by his grace and gives us everything we need to be who we are supposed to be and to do what we are supposed to do in marriage. What glorious and important reminder. http://www.desiringgod.org/interviews/romantic-love-is-a-wonderful-gift-and-a-terrible-god

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Truths about God’s glory and Jesus’ saving work are not just believed with the mind but create inner music… And because the object of this song is not favorable life circumstances (which can change) but rather the truth and grace is Jesus (which cannot), this heart song does not weaken in times of difficulty

Tim Keller, The meaning of marriage

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I can safely say, on the authority of all that is revealed in the Word of God, that any man or woman on this earth who is bored and turned off by worship is not ready for heaven

A.W. Tozer

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I shall not want

I shall not want

When I taste your goodness

I shall not want

Reminding myself not to grasp as I look onwards to what next semester as in store.

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I realized that the deepest spiritual lessons are not learned by His letting us have our way in the end, but by His making us wait, bearing with us in love and patience until we are able to honestly to pray what He taught His disciples to pray: Thy will be done.

Elizabeth Elliot

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Within this Christian vision for marriage, this is what it means to fall in love. It is to look at another person and get a glimpse of the person God is creating, and to say, "I see who God is making you, and it excites me! I want to be a part of that. I want to partner with you and God in the journey you are taking to his throne. And when we get there, I will look at your magnificence and say, 'I always knew you could be like this. I got a glimpse of it on earth, but now look at you! '"

Tim Keller, The Meaning of Marriage

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Conflict

“Conflict is the laboratory in which love (agapē) grows. Conflict is the construction area where humility is built. Conflict is the radiology department where pride is exposed. Conflict is the field where our treasure is unearthed. Conflict is a discipline God uses to make us holy and bear the peaceful fruit of righteousness” - Jon Bloom  

Not in the same context but so timely today. Constantly being humbled by the storms God throws my way...will elaborate more later.

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To be loved and not known is comforting but superficial. To be known and not loved is our greatest fear. But to be loved and fully known and truly loved is, well, a lot like being loved by God. It is what we need more than anything. It liberates us from pretense, humbles us out of our self-righteousness, and fortifies us for any difficulty life can throw at us

-Tim Keller, The Meaning of Marriage

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The cross was, in fact, the full expression of the world's feeling towards Him; "There," they seemed to say, "Thou Son of God, this is the manner in which God Himself should be treated, could we reach Him."

Charles Spurgeon, Morning and Evening

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That’s the nature and ugliness of work-worship — bowing down to the labor of our hands. And we’re all melting what God has given us and molding it into something that will serve us — our desires, our ego, our glory.... If we want to be truly happy in our jobs, we cannot base our happiness on our jobs or our abilities. Our worship and happiness must be anchored and rooted first and only in God. He has done all the work worthy of worship. With our hands on the plow and our hearts with God, then Peter may say of us, “Though you have not seen him, you love him. Though you do not now see him, you believe in him and rejoice [and work] with joy that is inexpressible and filled with glory” (1 Peter 1:8).

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Saints bear up under every discouragement, believing that all things work together for their good, and that out of apparent evils a real blessing shall ultimately spring - that their God will either work a deliverance for them speedily, or most assuredly support them in the trouble, as long as He is pleased to keep them in it.

Charles Spurgeon, Morning and Evening

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The gospel is this: we are more sinful and flawed in ourselves than we ever dared believe, yet at the very same time we are more loved and accepted in Jesus Christ than we ever dared hope. This is the only kind of relationship that will really transform us. Love without truth is sentimentality; it supports and affirms us but keeps us in denial about our flaws. Truth without love is harshness; it gives us information but in such a way that we cannot really hear it. God's saving love in Christ, however, is marked by both radical truthfulness about who we are and yet also radical, unconditional commitment to us.

Tim Keller, The Meaning of Marriage

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In all my wrongs, self-love and weakness, laziness and fear, this one thing I can say: I am content to be and have what in Thy heart I am meant to be and have. In my best times I long after thy will, and think its glorious-dear; even in my worst, perforce my will to thine is bent.

George Macdonald